Contending Issues in the Niger Delta Crisis of Nigeria - Journal of ...

Dr. Victor Ojakorotu and Olaopa Olawale
oil-producing states got from the federation account was increasingly
not commensurate with their contribution and sacrifices in producing
it, since the bulk of the revenue was derived from the extraction of oil
beneath their land. Apart from the increasing marginalization of the
oil producing areas in revenue allocation in the federation, there is
also the problem of ecological disaster and environmental degradation
that oil exploration, hazards of oil spillage and gas flaring engender in
those communities (Onduku, 2001; Iyoha and Adamu, 2002). Oil
exploration and its poor management, as manifested in oil spillage,
dislocates the economic life of the people as farming and fishing, the
main occupation of the people in the area, are decimated, their
environment polluted, and their water poisoned. On the
environmental impact of oil exploration in the Niger Delta, the Civil
Liberties Organization (CLO), a prominent human rights group in
Nigeria, asserts that:
Today, the entire Niger Delta and coastal wetlands of
Nigeria producing the nation’s oil wealth is well known
to be one of the most fragile ecosystems in the World. It
has also been labelled the most endangered delta in the
World. Demand for land is high being a densely
populated region (Ojo, 1996).
While their environment and means of livelihood are undermined,
little effort is made to recompense the Niger delta people with basic
infrastructure of electricity, roads, schools, potable water, cottage
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